Are you happy with your life? You know, like really happy. Think back to when you were a kid before life weathered you and you became jaded. What did the life you wanted look like? I’m here to kind of shatter your world a little bit. Guess what? You create your life by the stories you tell yourself and the actions you take. So, if you’re not happy, you can change your life by changing your story.
You might be thinking I’m crazy and talking woo-woo, but I’m actually not. This is honestly a very simple and basic phenomenon. And I’m going to share a real-life example with you.
How many of you have been following this blog since the beginning? We’re talking like, 2010/2011. I was Joey back then, but I was most certainly not this girl. That Joey believed her creative writing degree was useless. She believed only other people got to have the kind of life she wanted. And she created a very easy narrative for herself to live out. She liked nail polish, so she practiced obsessively, talked about it often, and shared way too many pictures of manicures on this blog. She also told herself she wasn’t smart enough to go after the kind of creative career she actually wanted, so she made herself believe she was the best damn nanny in the market.
Over time, she became known as the girl who knew all things nail polish, and she was the best damn nanny in the market. That Joey did things according to the story she told herself. And that story became her reality.
It’s easy to do that; to adopt a narrative that’s easier for you to believe. And those narratives are often born of limiting beliefs we use to define ourselves. Over the years, you collect little tokens of information about yourself; some of it will be true. Some of it won’t be. But all of it blends together to form your story. And that story, which is often based on mostly false information that other people have made you believe about yourself becomes your life.
A few days ago, someone who has been a long time follower of this blog texted me with a question. She’d started a company and was experiencing some trouble, so she came to me for some advice. I answered her question easily then returned to my work. A little while later, it hit me.
Huh, I thought. People used to come to me for advice on which nail polish to buy. Now they come to me for advice on how to run a business.
I changed my life by changing my story.
For those of you who may not know, I quit the last nanny job I’ll ever have back in 2016 to launch a company that used my talents and my degree. When I did that, it was a total leap of faith. I wasn’t 100% positive that I could do it. That I could make something from nothing; that I could change who I was just because I wanted to. Because the truth is, that change changed more than just my day job. Quitting my job was an out loud challenge of what I believed about myself. Instead of believing I couldn’t, I started telling myself maybe you can. Why not you?
This kind of life change is easy but complex. But I fully believe in you. You can change your life by changing your story. How? Okay, let’s do this.
Own your past narrative.
While a lot of our limiting beliefs come from stories we’ve collected from other people, some of them are due to our past behaviors. Own the parts that you’re responsible for, and own the fact that you let yourself believe the stories other people told you about yourself. In order to enter into a place of change and growth, you first have to come to peace with the past. Listen, we all have a limiting belief narrative. No one is exempt from this, not even the boldest, bravest person you know. So it’s imperative that you show yourself grace, patience and kindness as you start to tackle your old story. It’s okay. This old story doesn’t have to define the rest of your life.
Filter through that narrative.
Is it (still) true? Stories can change. What was once true may not be anymore, and that’s okay; that’s called growth and progression. I used to always have a phone glued to my ear. In fact, my parents actually bought me a portable phone with a plug-in headset for Christmas when I was in middle school because I was literally always on the phone. If you call me now, I probably won’t answer. I loathe the phone. There’s no real reason why that story changed, I just grew up and evolved. We’re not meant to always be the same people. Our interests change. We learn things. Our experiences shape us. But I think it’s incredibly hard to let go of the definitions those once-truths gave to our lives. Just because something was true in one season of your life doesn’t mean it has to come with you into the next season.
Filter through your old narrative. Keep the truths that still feel relevant to who you want to be. Ditch the rest.
Write a new story.
You are in control. You have the ultimate power to write your own story and to create your own life. You just have to narrow in on what that life looks like. What do you want? What are the new truths you want to use to define this next chapter of your life? Maybe you need to lean into those uncomfortable places. Those things that you want but scare you. I like to start this process by asking myself who would I be if failure weren’t part of the equation. What would I do if fear weren’t an issue? For me, this season of my life started with some important realizations.
- I am perfectly capable of doing the things that set my soul on fire.
- I had to fire that little voice in the back of my mind that tells me that only other people get to live this life. Sure, I still hear that voice, I’ve just taken away its power. It’s been working out okay. 🙃
- Failure is make-believe. It’s not real. Failure is only what you make of something. I’ve never failed. But I’ve figured out a whole bunch of ways that something doesn’t work.
So, are you with me? Are you ready to change your life? Okay, but first, you have to change your story. I have a FREE DOWNLOAD for you that’ll walk you through the process of changing your story with prompts and my favorite affirmations. Grab yours! 👇🏻
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